11-03-2015, 11:23 PM
@Stephan 
Welcome to your own personal review done by me! I’ll be putting it into categories, starting with “As I go along” (which will intercept some of the paragraphs and give you a bit of less specific feedback.
The beginning was nice, a small bit of review showing what was going on and how he arrived there, plus I just liked the starting sentence, it had a nice flavor to it.
Small suggestion, change “the eye” to his eyes, it keeps with the already established pattern in the previous sentence.
Another one is to use “quotation marks” even when you are identifying with color. Personally, I prefer to keep away from bold or color, as it can get distracting, but I will use italics for emphasis and thought.
I personally enjoy scenery (and it’s something I always encourage), so some of what you did here,
Could be added to in the future, a few pages back I suggested to Demetri that he increase his setting using adjectives and descriptions to make the world around him a bit more “real” and that really improved the post he wanted to work on.
Small things like the horrible heat (which is expected) in addition to some personal observation that your character might notice, can help the reader have something in common with your character. You did mention the dust, but adding that it was grainy after he had swallowed/coughed up some, could have added some beneficial texture to the scene.
You did that well here:
[spoiler]Stephan was thrown violently through the air flying a couple of meters and landing hard on his back. From the looks of it the broken body was far too damaged to anything but bleed out slowly. The assaulting car stopped, bent metal in its front screeching loudly and some spikes falling off. The rest of the cars swiftly caught up with the leader, honking and shooting crude guns up in the air as they went.
“Jo-has! Jo-has!”
They chanted. The driver of the front, who just must have been that very “Johas” ,climbed out of his vehicle and raised his hands triumphantly. The driver was dressed in only in baggy pants and some leathery belts that looked suspiciously like suspenders. His sinewy, but imposing and strong frame was covered tattoos and scars, most of which looked like bullet wounds, far too many actually. He was obviously delighted, but then he twitched.
MOMMA WANTS TO EAT!
Johas dashed back into his car with a scream. The rest of the raiders met that turn of events with more honking and expectant screams. The cars, circling the scene up to this moment, formed a rough shape, stopping around the prone figure. That was twitching and smoking faintly at this point. Huh, when did he manage to catch fire? Anyway, the rest of the assailants climbed out of their cars and onto them, waiting for the coming show impatiently. Most of them were dressed similar to Johas, but some wore makeshift armor, made from scraps and an occasional tire, the more decent looking ones had some sort of a projectile weapon, from pistols and hand crossbows to shotguns and wait a second did that one actually have a blaster on him? Huh, damn stormtrooper deserters… The half-naked bandits mostly swung about with the clubs, axes and buzzsaws, small circular axe-like automated saws, those were the most unstable of the group, while their faces hid behind white-metal masks the sounds they were making were disconcerting at best. By the moment Johas jumped out of his car the other fifteen or so bandits made themselves comfortable on top of their cars, banging their fists on the hulls in a steadily growing rhythm.
FEED THE MOMMA! MEAT TO MOMMA! MOMMA TEAR MOMMA FEED MOMMA LOVE US!
The bandit champion was waving something above his head, yelling madly as the fists hit the metal. At one point he stopped, just as suddenly as everything else he did. That was the moment the thing became visible. A small scale industrial chainsaw, dangling wires and ripped metal parts it was once obviously a part of a bigger, likely stationary, machine before. But that wasn’t what caught the eye. A dried up head of a woman replacing the chassis was. Its mouth was open, as if screeching, or waiting to be fed, and the rusty, worn chain was going out right through the nose. The rest of the gang was ecstatic. They kept on banging and screaming words, as if stuck in some kind of a bloody trance, waiting for the show the “Momma” was about to put on.
Spoiler:
A prone figure finally moved, turning itself over. The hat fell off into the dirt and most of the uniform was a torn mess, caught on the spikes and then thrown around. The tiny rivulets of smoke floating upwards began gaining some actual form, as if the man was just barely put out after being set on fire. But instead of decreasing in volume and opacity they only became more and more apparent, now obvious to anyone who cared to look. As Stephan raised himself from the ground onto his elbows, still twitching periodically, he was yanked violently upwards by a free hand of the screaming madman above him, who wanted his “sacrifice” standing. Barely keeping his footing captain stumbled a bit forward.
SMOKEY MAN TOUGH, MOMMA LOVE WHEN THEY TOUGH, TOUGH BLEED BETTER, TOUGH BLEED MORE!
Johas just kept screaming.
TALK TO MOMMA SMOKEY!
Stephan twitched again, then again, and then he started laughing heartily.
Thank you, madman from the wasteland! Thank you!
The insane man was obviously not amused, and those from the “audience” who had the mental capacity to get concerned still didn’t go out of their trance.
SMOKEY TALKS TO MOMMA, MOMMA HUGS SMOKEY!
He swung his “mother” upwards in a wide arc and threw it down on the victim. Only for the whirling, rusty chain to be caught by the metal hand with an impotent screech and churn as the blade bent and electric motor malfunctioned, not used to being thrown against steel.
I know just what to do now.[/spoiler]
In this post, you described the action very well, and I felt the danger from the crazy chainsaw bandit! My only reflection for improvement would bet that you keep track of your character during the action, and show a little of what he was thinking during it. It adds perspective, and during the middle I wasn’t sure how Stephan was doing.
I got a really good sense of “mad max” in the last post. It was intense.
This is the quote of the year xD it really amused me.
Right after it, there was a huge wall of text. Just be careful with that, and I think there could have been a paragraph separator in there about halfway through!
“Tom put out the dog, then he took out the trash.” We know Tom did both of these things, and every time there is a “he,” grammatically it pertains to the person mentioned just before (unless the sex differs), in the above case, we don’t know if the dog is a girl, but it is an animal, so the noun “dog” remains unimposing on this rule, whereas Johas has been defined as male.
Great adjective, (I was eating, I could feel the imagery, enough said) *horror/ appreciation*
Other than those two things, it was an epic fight scene! You had great variation and diversity, as well as a good amount of imagery and description, keep it up!
This bit of ST dialogue was really awesome, and lead into the story perfectly.
Hmm, I noticed you frequently separate your dialogue with a hyphen, usually and correctly, it will be separated the way you were quoted above, or with a comma in front or just before the quotation marks end.
Quick example. As Tom took out the dog, he then said, “Come here, Marley!”
Or
“MARLEY, YOU BETTER COME HERE!” he shouted so that the entire neighborhood could hear.
I liked what happened right here, so much was said in so very little, and that conciseness was really awesome to me, the reader. Caution/something to keep in mind: be careful with perspective. With a new paragraph, it became Sarge’s thoughts. I wasn’t sure what he was directly thinking, and was he felt, so just keep in mind that separators make it easier and more concise (even just italics) for the reader to understand. We want a fluent paragraph that narrates and describes what is going on. Anything less would be restricting to the story we are trying to tell and our audience’s imagination.
This part was informative, it told the reader what he is looking at, and offered a bit of insight on what he was thinking. First impressions can even show the state of mind Stephan is in, and I got a distinct idea of his state, even though it was not described outwardly.
This blip speed up the tempo of the story a bit, and finally gave the reader some information that anyone curious was definitely hoping for. I like the run-down, and the way it happened, revolving around Rick’s cafe, and the bartender, it was all very natural, and very impactive. What followed was pretty great too, because you took a nice spin on delivering some new information to Stephan.
The Captain’s skepticism before he began to summon really added a good foundation as to where he came from, and what he knew to be true in his world. I liked the way it was brought about, and I like that Rick was the teacher! The items he chose to summon were intriguing as well.
-------------
Overall: the story was good and very action-themed. I wasn’t sure the kind of review you wanted, so I started off a little construction and then I’d like to get into some plot stuff if that’s okay.
Before I continue, about halfway through, I felt you got a little better with your dialogue and diction, which cleared up a bit of the cohesion for the reader. Did something change? I felt the quality grew in just a short time alone, that most of my suggestions above were less relevant afterward. somysuggestionsaren’tallrelevantanymore
Plot! and other things... Where will he go from there? I was left curious, and was interested to see if you had another thread going, and very intrigued as to what you would and could do to continue. What are some of your ideas for him? I really like the way his character has grown in such a short time and a short thread.
You are solid in knowing your character well (as I felt he didn’t change drastically one minute to the next) and I liked your use of dialogue and wanted to promote it more, as well as your use of imagery, and perspective on Stephan.
Some other things I want you to keep in mind, is that a good writing partner could really help your progress, and the character’s progress as he familiarizes himself with the new world he has been transported to. You could go many different routes, and I think there are some fun options there.
Lastly, your writing is fun, you are creative, and I think anyone who has an open thread would value your skills and input on their story as well. Good work on this topic, I hope to read more of him soon, and good luck in the future Stephan!
Welcome to your own personal review done by me! I’ll be putting it into categories, starting with “As I go along” (which will intercept some of the paragraphs and give you a bit of less specific feedback.
The beginning was nice, a small bit of review showing what was going on and how he arrived there, plus I just liked the starting sentence, it had a nice flavor to it.
Quote:He was immediately assaulted by the blazing heat from all around and blindingly bright sun from on above. Eventually the eye adjusted to light and a scene of desolated town unfurled before the vision of the Captain.
Small suggestion, change “the eye” to his eyes, it keeps with the already established pattern in the previous sentence.
Another one is to use “quotation marks” even when you are identifying with color. Personally, I prefer to keep away from bold or color, as it can get distracting, but I will use italics for emphasis and thought.
I personally enjoy scenery (and it’s something I always encourage), so some of what you did here,
Quote: “One of them even went close enough that the cloud of dust it brought up covered the somewhat-clean uniform in a fine layer of dirt.”
Could be added to in the future, a few pages back I suggested to Demetri that he increase his setting using adjectives and descriptions to make the world around him a bit more “real” and that really improved the post he wanted to work on.
Small things like the horrible heat (which is expected) in addition to some personal observation that your character might notice, can help the reader have something in common with your character. You did mention the dust, but adding that it was grainy after he had swallowed/coughed up some, could have added some beneficial texture to the scene.
You did that well here:
Quote:He was covered in dust and breathing heavily, but still pushed on, putting one leg ahead of another and then again. He could swear that he saw an silhouette of a town he was heading for on the horizon just moment ago but that might just been a mirage birthed by the descending sun.
[spoiler]Stephan was thrown violently through the air flying a couple of meters and landing hard on his back. From the looks of it the broken body was far too damaged to anything but bleed out slowly. The assaulting car stopped, bent metal in its front screeching loudly and some spikes falling off. The rest of the cars swiftly caught up with the leader, honking and shooting crude guns up in the air as they went.
“Jo-has! Jo-has!”
They chanted. The driver of the front, who just must have been that very “Johas” ,climbed out of his vehicle and raised his hands triumphantly. The driver was dressed in only in baggy pants and some leathery belts that looked suspiciously like suspenders. His sinewy, but imposing and strong frame was covered tattoos and scars, most of which looked like bullet wounds, far too many actually. He was obviously delighted, but then he twitched.
MOMMA WANTS TO EAT!
Johas dashed back into his car with a scream. The rest of the raiders met that turn of events with more honking and expectant screams. The cars, circling the scene up to this moment, formed a rough shape, stopping around the prone figure. That was twitching and smoking faintly at this point. Huh, when did he manage to catch fire? Anyway, the rest of the assailants climbed out of their cars and onto them, waiting for the coming show impatiently. Most of them were dressed similar to Johas, but some wore makeshift armor, made from scraps and an occasional tire, the more decent looking ones had some sort of a projectile weapon, from pistols and hand crossbows to shotguns and wait a second did that one actually have a blaster on him? Huh, damn stormtrooper deserters… The half-naked bandits mostly swung about with the clubs, axes and buzzsaws, small circular axe-like automated saws, those were the most unstable of the group, while their faces hid behind white-metal masks the sounds they were making were disconcerting at best. By the moment Johas jumped out of his car the other fifteen or so bandits made themselves comfortable on top of their cars, banging their fists on the hulls in a steadily growing rhythm.
FEED THE MOMMA! MEAT TO MOMMA! MOMMA TEAR MOMMA FEED MOMMA LOVE US!
The bandit champion was waving something above his head, yelling madly as the fists hit the metal. At one point he stopped, just as suddenly as everything else he did. That was the moment the thing became visible. A small scale industrial chainsaw, dangling wires and ripped metal parts it was once obviously a part of a bigger, likely stationary, machine before. But that wasn’t what caught the eye. A dried up head of a woman replacing the chassis was. Its mouth was open, as if screeching, or waiting to be fed, and the rusty, worn chain was going out right through the nose. The rest of the gang was ecstatic. They kept on banging and screaming words, as if stuck in some kind of a bloody trance, waiting for the show the “Momma” was about to put on.
Spoiler:
A prone figure finally moved, turning itself over. The hat fell off into the dirt and most of the uniform was a torn mess, caught on the spikes and then thrown around. The tiny rivulets of smoke floating upwards began gaining some actual form, as if the man was just barely put out after being set on fire. But instead of decreasing in volume and opacity they only became more and more apparent, now obvious to anyone who cared to look. As Stephan raised himself from the ground onto his elbows, still twitching periodically, he was yanked violently upwards by a free hand of the screaming madman above him, who wanted his “sacrifice” standing. Barely keeping his footing captain stumbled a bit forward.
SMOKEY MAN TOUGH, MOMMA LOVE WHEN THEY TOUGH, TOUGH BLEED BETTER, TOUGH BLEED MORE!
Johas just kept screaming.
TALK TO MOMMA SMOKEY!
Stephan twitched again, then again, and then he started laughing heartily.
Thank you, madman from the wasteland! Thank you!
The insane man was obviously not amused, and those from the “audience” who had the mental capacity to get concerned still didn’t go out of their trance.
SMOKEY TALKS TO MOMMA, MOMMA HUGS SMOKEY!
He swung his “mother” upwards in a wide arc and threw it down on the victim. Only for the whirling, rusty chain to be caught by the metal hand with an impotent screech and churn as the blade bent and electric motor malfunctioned, not used to being thrown against steel.
I know just what to do now.[/spoiler]
In this post, you described the action very well, and I felt the danger from the crazy chainsaw bandit! My only reflection for improvement would bet that you keep track of your character during the action, and show a little of what he was thinking during it. It adds perspective, and during the middle I wasn’t sure how Stephan was doing.
I got a really good sense of “mad max” in the last post. It was intense.
Quote: “Shit, that’s a Prime!” - huh, this must have come from one of the sane ones.
This is the quote of the year xD it really amused me.
Right after it, there was a huge wall of text. Just be careful with that, and I think there could have been a paragraph separator in there about halfway through!
Quote:While Johas was still trying to pull his weapon from the, literally, steely grip of his opponent almost 8 psychotic bastards rushed Stephan from left and behind. ‘Almost’ because one of them was barely a meter tall. Aaaaaand yes, he was just trampled over. Damn, is he still giggling?Keep an eye on your pronouns.
“Tom put out the dog, then he took out the trash.” We know Tom did both of these things, and every time there is a “he,” grammatically it pertains to the person mentioned just before (unless the sex differs), in the above case, we don’t know if the dog is a girl, but it is an animal, so the noun “dog” remains unimposing on this rule, whereas Johas has been defined as male.
Quote:The spinning chunk of metal hit one of them square in the chest, crushing the ribs with a wet sound,
Great adjective, (I was eating, I could feel the imagery, enough said) *horror/ appreciation*
Other than those two things, it was an epic fight scene! You had great variation and diversity, as well as a good amount of imagery and description, keep it up!
Quote:“Damn it, newbie, we do not question orders! We foll…” sergeant trailed off. There was a small cloud of dust coming their way, as if a vehicle or two were running around in the savannah.
“Get your gun and helmet. We might be getting some guests.” Stormtrooper jumped to his feet, as if he wasn’t resting just a minute ago, in a flash the dusty helmet was back on his head and he was readying his blaster for whatever could be coming their way.
This bit of ST dialogue was really awesome, and lead into the story perfectly.
Hmm, I noticed you frequently separate your dialogue with a hyphen, usually and correctly, it will be separated the way you were quoted above, or with a comma in front or just before the quotation marks end.
Quick example. As Tom took out the dog, he then said, “Come here, Marley!”
Or
“MARLEY, YOU BETTER COME HERE!” he shouted so that the entire neighborhood could hear.
Quote:Sarge stared at him for a moment, looking at dirty clothing, ruined hat and gleaming metal part of a man in front of him. Obviously a prime. He wasn’t dealing with this. Standing around in the desert wasn’t worth trying to stop an obviously dangerous individual. He also killed some bandits for all that is worth, so maybe it wouldn’t be as bad.
I liked what happened right here, so much was said in so very little, and that conciseness was really awesome to me, the reader. Caution/something to keep in mind: be careful with perspective. With a new paragraph, it became Sarge’s thoughts. I wasn’t sure what he was directly thinking, and was he felt, so just keep in mind that separators make it easier and more concise (even just italics) for the reader to understand. We want a fluent paragraph that narrates and describes what is going on. Anything less would be restricting to the story we are trying to tell and our audience’s imagination.
Quote:“It’s my goddamn job to give you pep talk, get to work." - Sarge put his hand to the comm, - "Hey, Rick? Yeah, it's me. There is a prime going your way, pour him one on me, he dealt with... Ithink it is Johas, but I'm not sure, head is too fucked up. Yeah. Yup. I think he is new here, he didn't even summon a drive for himself. No, he took one of their cars. Damn just ask him yourself, he is limping your way."This paragraph did a lot to enhance the story and plot, as well as give a fresh/ respected perspective on how your character is seen by others in the Omniverse.
Quote:”Carreeeeforrre… name’s just as dead as the rest of the place” he mumbled as he walked past the ‘Welcome to Carrefore’ sign, the place was quite desolate to be honest. While there were no obvious ruins and gaping broken windows even a newcomer, like our old man, could see that almost half the buildings were either empty, hollowed out shells or long abandoned and left to slowly rot under the sun, at the mercy of neglect and wind.
This part was informative, it told the reader what he is looking at, and offered a bit of insight on what he was thinking. First impressions can even show the state of mind Stephan is in, and I got a distinct idea of his state, even though it was not described outwardly.
Quote:swallowed it in one go the barkeep asked:
“So what the hell happened? You honestly look like shit.”
A glimpse of anger appeared in Stephan's eye for a moment, but it quickly vanished.
“Yeah, you’re right. I do. I kinda just appeared in the middle of empty white nothingness… when was it… the last day I guess? After that I just sat around for a couple of hours, and then chose a direction to go to, went through some gate, walked for a half-a-damn-day in between the bushes, got ran over, killed those who didn’t run, stole their engine and now I am here.”
This blip speed up the tempo of the story a bit, and finally gave the reader some information that anyone curious was definitely hoping for. I like the run-down, and the way it happened, revolving around Rick’s cafe, and the bartender, it was all very natural, and very impactive. What followed was pretty great too, because you took a nice spin on delivering some new information to Stephan.
Quote:“Why didn’t I what? I’m not some stage magician to just pull wheels out of my hat I’ll have you know.”
“Oh, don’t tell me you managed to ignore that little brief the Big O gives to all the Primes?”
The Captain’s skepticism before he began to summon really added a good foundation as to where he came from, and what he knew to be true in his world. I liked the way it was brought about, and I like that Rick was the teacher! The items he chose to summon were intriguing as well.
Quote:”Wait, I didn’t even get his name… Eh, I guess it was Rick.”It was a firm ending, however, I felt like “really” could have been omitted or replaced by something else, as I felt it was indecisive on his action.. An example to change the mood would be, “Not daring to look back.” which implies hesitation, or “Not bothering to look back.” which implies he has something (a bright future) to look forward to.
Past another post of bored guards in dirty white gear Stephan could only see the sand. It was far worse than on the other side of the town, where there was at least a couple of bushes and trees dotting the landscape here and there. Here, there was just the endless sand, flowing like waves in the ocean. After a short stop to remember and then summon something fitting for the landscape Stephan shot off into the Dunes, not really looking back.
-------------
Overall: the story was good and very action-themed. I wasn’t sure the kind of review you wanted, so I started off a little construction and then I’d like to get into some plot stuff if that’s okay.
Before I continue, about halfway through, I felt you got a little better with your dialogue and diction, which cleared up a bit of the cohesion for the reader. Did something change? I felt the quality grew in just a short time alone, that most of my suggestions above were less relevant afterward. somysuggestionsaren’tallrelevantanymore
Plot! and other things... Where will he go from there? I was left curious, and was interested to see if you had another thread going, and very intrigued as to what you would and could do to continue. What are some of your ideas for him? I really like the way his character has grown in such a short time and a short thread.
You are solid in knowing your character well (as I felt he didn’t change drastically one minute to the next) and I liked your use of dialogue and wanted to promote it more, as well as your use of imagery, and perspective on Stephan.
Some other things I want you to keep in mind, is that a good writing partner could really help your progress, and the character’s progress as he familiarizes himself with the new world he has been transported to. You could go many different routes, and I think there are some fun options there.
Lastly, your writing is fun, you are creative, and I think anyone who has an open thread would value your skills and input on their story as well. Good work on this topic, I hope to read more of him soon, and good luck in the future Stephan!
![[Image: -Gildarts-fairy-tail-35651033-300-180.gif]](http://images6.fanpop.com/image/photos/35600000/-Gildarts-fairy-tail-35651033-300-180.gif)
"I have never met a strong person with an easy past." -Atticus